Love who?
“Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you.” (Luke 6:27b)
Our Bible verse for this week is one of those passages of the Bible which even many Christians admit is difficult to put into practice.
It is easy to love those who love you. It is easy to love those whom you know will return that love. But it almost seems counter intuitive to express or extend love to those who are your enemies or even as our verse says “those who hate you.”
To understand the meaning and purpose of our verse for this week, we need to remember that what Jesus is asking us to do is exactly what he did for us. We may not think of it that way, but every time we sin we are really acting as God’s enemy. We think we know better than God. We think we can slap God in the face, use his name to curse or swear and then expect him to act as if nothing happened. Think of how God demonstrated his love toward every single one of us who has acted as his enemy more times than we can count. He had his son live perfectly for all the times we have been his horribly imperfect enemies and then he also had his Son die innocently to pay for all the crimes we have committed as his enemies.
God can certainly expect us to love our enemies and do go to those who hate us because he has done that in a way we can never achieve!
We also need to remember another directive which Jesus gave “Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:16). Not only is loving our enemies and doing good for them fulfilling God’s command, Jesus also teaches us that in so doing we may actually point someone to Jesus. What an awesome way to live your faith and in so doing you may actually be sharing your faith with someone else.
Maybe you have heard of someone who was asked why they act so different than most people. They have then had the opportunity to share their faith and how it guides and motivates them in their life. What an awesome testimony to how someone lets their light shine and in so doing people may actually be led to praise God.
It is never going to be easy to carry out the directive of our Savior in our verse for this week. Remember how the one who directs us to do this has already done it for us and he himself also gives us the willingness and strength to actually do this in our own lives.